We are all needy – part 2

Well, did you think about it? Did you think about your answer to the question, “Can you think of any time management problem that isn’t connected at the root to fulfilling one of those needs?”

I’ve opined in the past that once we know what we are about (or what we are for), the rest of it is time management and communication. (I’m rather smug that Stephen Covey thought the same thing, having worked it out for myself, a momentary intellectual parallel to the great man.)

Our biggest challenges arise when we are stopped from doing what we think we should be doing, are they not?

If we are prevented from taking action because procedures change, laws are made that slow us down or add bureaucracy to our fun, we get frustrated if we have to wait, and we get disappointed and angry if we are just plain stopped from doing it ever again. (I used to love car chases until they stopped me playing on 2001.) A lot of those influences are outside our direct control, and all we can do is proactively grin and bear it (unless we can find a loophole).

Look at it from outside – we are stopped from doing something which pays us, which we love or which we do with those we love, which made us clever and now requires more effort to re-learn, or which gave us meaning and now we can’t do it. All of these are time management problems in the sense that we have to re-adjust how we do what we do, and doing what we do is why we have to manage our time.

Of course, there are also self-imposed obstacles to us living our best life – unwillingness to change, unwillingness to learn, inter-personal differences and a reluctance to invest our finances into something – all Four Needs’ time management problems. And all within our Circle of Influence in terms of the problem to be solved.

When you can’t do something because you haven’t managed your time properly, because (in turn) you haven’t taken the time to discover, learn, apply and master a time management system, your needs won’t be met as well as they could have been met.

If you don’t manage your time well, you can’t take your daughter to that event you looked forward to, which you could enjoy together. If you don’t manage your time well, you can’t exercise with your friends and fulfil a physical and socio-emotional need to connect. If you don’t manage your time well, you may not collect, study and fully understand the data you need for that job interview that will set you up for life. If you don’t manage your time well you may never join that Institute that created intellectual and contribution opportunities that changed your life.

You can, probably, live a reasonably successful life without a time management ‘system’. But it would be a life led by luck, by waiting for opportunities to arise instead of making them happen. Jim Rohn famously said that people who don’t have a plan usually work for someone who does have a plan. “And what have they got planned for you? Not much.”

Are your four needs – to Live, to Love, to Learn and to Leave a Legacy – being met?

If not, ask yourself this – “Will having a values-based, meaning orientated time management system help me meet my needs as a human being?”

Stupid question – you know the answer. It’s just that some of you will now pretend that you’re too clever for that.

It’s called Denial. Try admitting it and try spending a few quid learning better.